Tag Archives: Fox Searchlight Pictures

For most of Enough Said, I marveled at how director Holofcener–apparently in an act entirely lacking irony–created the perfect film to fail the Bechdel test. The Bechdel test, which is all the rage, requires two female characters talk about something besides men.

Well, besides talking about men, the characters in Said do not do much. Lead Julia Louis-Dreyfus otherwise makes acerbic observations about those around her or the minutiae of her life; I wish I could know how the film played if one is unfamiliar with a certain show about nothing starring Louis-Dreyfus, but I cannot. It probably wouldn’t be much better, because Holofcener isn’t just lazy at the plotting, she’s lazy with the characters.

Here’s the idea (straight out of a “Seinfeld”). Louis-Dreyfus starts seeing James Gandolfini (even though he’s fat–she’s supposed to be out of shape too, in one of Enough Said’s more absurd requests for the viewer to suspend their disbelief). She’s a masseuse. Her new client–an exceptionally wasted Catherine Keener–turns out to be really cool and they become friends. Oh, and Keener’s Gandolfini’s ex-wife. Which Elaine–sorry, sorry–which Louis-Dreyfus figures out and keeps to herself.

The film wastes the more interesting empty nest subplot involving Louis-Dreyfus bonding with her daughter’s friend, Tavi Gevinson. Sure, they fail the Bechdel test too, but not as bad as the rest of the film.

Bad editing from Robert Frazen. Great performance from Gandolfini.

Enough’s pointless and slight.

★½

CREDITS

Written and directed by Nicole Holofcener; director of photography, Xavier Grobet; edited by Robert Frazen; music by Marcelo Zarvos; production designer, Keith P. Cunningham; produced by Stefanie Azpiazu and Anthony Bregman; released by Fox Searchlight Pictures.

At a certain point during The Way, Way Back, it became clear the film was never going to do anything interesting. Then, all of a sudden, writer-directors Faxon and Rash get to their “realistic” ending–by realistic, I mean it doesn’t resolve the most important story lines–and even though the film isn’t going to reward the viewer, at least it’s doing something different.

Then they go back on it. And given both Faxon and Rash appear in the film, when they show up, it almost feels like they couldn’t make that bold a move. Back is a film without any bold moves. It’s about a teenager (Liam James) who goes off to spend the summer with his mom, her boyfriend and the boyfriend’s daughter.

Steve Carell’s a great jerk as the boyfriend, but there are no layers to his character. Toni Collette plays the mom; she’s similarly shallow, though Faxon and Rush seem to get she shouldn’t be.

Thanks to the cute girl next door (AnnaSophia Robb) and the awesome, immature water park owner–Sam Rockwell in just as much a type-casted role as Collette’s–James eventually comes into his own. Yep, it’s a standard growing up story.

I won’t spoil if Collette gets her act together thanks to her kid.

A lot of the film is appealing. James is good in the lead–he plays it hostile, which is cool. Robb’s good, Alison Janney’s fun as her partying mom, Rockwell’s great.

But there’s nothing to it.

★½

CREDITS

Written and directed by Nat Faxon and Jim Rash; director of photography, John Bailey; edited by Tatiana S. Riegel; music by Rob Simonsen; production designer, Mark Ricker; produced by Tom Rice and Kevin J. Walsh; released by Fox Searchlight Pictures.

Trance is extremely cute. It’s sort of Hitchcockian, with James McAvoy actually playing the female role and Rosario Dawson the male. Director Boyle and screenwriters Joe Ahearne and John Hodge figure out some neat ways to change up expectations of that relationship along the way. Besides being a technical marvel, full of good performances, Trance’s most important feature might be its approach to gender roles.

The film opens as tough but fun heist picture. Boyle skips around the narrative, building toward a big reveal. Only Trance reveals its biggest twist about halfway through. The final revelations are significant, but they aren’t the MacGuffin. Boyle and the writers manage to move past the MacGuffin reveal into new territory. Some of it isn’t expected (there’s a little too much foreshadowing, but one could also just chalk it up to good acting).

Both McAvoy and Dawson are fantastic. She’s the better, just because she has a lot more to do. McAvoy just acts slightly crazy and lost as an amnesiac. Dawson’s got to hold it together as the shrink he goes to see. Meanwhile, Trance is also a crime movie, so small time crook Vincent Cassel is also in the picture.

Amazing photography from Anthony Dod Mantle (anyone who complains about lens flares needs to see this one), editing from Jon Harris and music from Rick Smith. The filmmaking is so strong, at some point I realized the conclusion barely mattered.

But Boyle’s got a good conclusion too. It’s rough and great.

★★★

CREDITS

Directed by Danny Boyle; written by Jon Ahearne and John Hodge; director of photography, Anthony Dod Mantle; edited by Jon Harris; music by Rick Smith; production designer, Mark Tildesley; produced by Boyle and Christian Colson; released by Fox Searchlight Pictures.

Malick shot The Tree of Life in a variety of formats, but it displays at 1.85:1. It’s his first 1.85:1 since the seventies and, somehow, it feels like the film would be more intimate wider.

Somewhere in Tree of Life, there’s a great film. Not the best film Malick’s ever made or anything along those lines, but there’s a great film. But he adds a lot; most awkward is his rumination on God. Most of it comes from Jessica Chastain’s character (wife to Brad Pitt, mother to Hunter McCracken, who’s played by Sean Penn in the present day scenes). But Chastain isn’t the lead in the great film somewhere in Tree of Life. The great film is about Pitt and McCracken.

Penn’s presence—and the modern day stuff—is useless (except to spot Joanna Going, who’s been gone too long from cinema). Malick’s got a birth of the universe sequence, he’s got a bunch of dinosaurs (while the scenes are lovely, the CG isn’t)… but it’s Penn who’s out of place. It undermines what Malick does in the film’s best moments.

Some of the photographic effects are wondrous and Emmanuel Lubezki’s photography is great. Alexandre Desplat’s music is excellent as well.

Malick gets a great performance from Pitt and from McCracken and the cast in general.

When the film fails, it’s nice to see it fail because of Malick’s reaching and failing to grasp something, not because of casting or historical accuracy. It’s an honest, sometimes wonderful disappointment.

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La Haine (1995, Mathieu Kassovitz)-Mostly outstanding night in the life picture about three young men, one White (Vincent Cassel), one Black (Hubert Koundé), and one Arab (Saïd Taghmaoui); the city is rioting after police assault one of their peers. Writer-director Kassovitz never gets preachy, impressive given it's shot in atmospheric black and white, but he does get predictable, constraining the narrative a tad much. Excellent work from Koundé, with Cassel a strong second.
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